Jesus feeds 5,000...

so last week was crazy on many levels!  first of all, we were busy preparing for our fundraiser garage sale for our travel expenses.  we had a lot to go through, and for whatever reason, we decided to wait until the last minute!  weird!!

early in the week, we had a conference call with our agency.  the lead gal from our agency had just gotten back from escorting a couple of the families on their trip to pick up their children in the congo, so there was a lot of information to be had.  long story short, the process is moving significantly faster than we all expected!  we waited not-so-patiently the rest of the week to hear the status of our particular case, and learned thursday that we are going to be traveling much sooner than we expected!!  we are super excited, but i can assure you, that has put a bit of a furry in our step around here.  we were expecting plenty of time to prepare, but that has been shortened by, well...a lot!  i must confess, the news came with mixed emotions.  we had a summer full of fun planned with our boys, and that seems to have disappeared in a matter of a 20 minute phone call.  it's not that we are not super excited to get our girls.  we have been longing for them to be here with us for far too long.  but we had plans, and once again, God has different plans!  i'm not sure when i'll learn to rest in His timing, but it's obvious i haven't learned my lesson yet!  so, here we go, ready or not!!! 

but, no time to digest the news, we need to saddle up for our garage sale friday and saturday!  we live out on a farm, so our gracious friends offered to have the sale at their house in town.  i'm pretty sure they won't do that again!!  :)  we had so much stuff donated (a huge thank you to all who did), their three car garage was stuffed to the brim.  now they aren't the average people that have their garage littered with their own stuff, they can actually get their cars in!  well, they could before the donations flooded in anyway!  so there was a full three car garage full of donations from generous people, some whom we don't even know!  one thing i can say, it was a miracle we got things priced!  we had a group of us getting ready wednesday evening, and we all took a good long stare for some time not even knowing where to begin!!  but thanks to the motivation of one of our trusty cheerleaders, we got motivated and took one bite at a time! 

so we planned on starting the sale friday at 9a.  as i pulled into their neighborhood, there was a sign for another sale that started at 8a.  as we start putting our first table out, people were already lining the street.  we tried to be as gracious as possible when we turned them away so we could catch a breath to get stuff out!  but it seemed like it didn't slow down all day! 

it was crazy, but we had so much fun!  we got to visit with a bunch of our friends (well, they're more like family) and share our story of God's new blessings for our family with so many different people.  we are so blessed to have fantastic people there to help, share in our journey, and support us each step of the way! 

or to just give us moral support!!  just kidding...she was testing the couch and ended up getting it, and a bunch of other things, for her son for college!  love that family!  thanks for the support team t!

 

here's the girls catching up!!








and here's hubby busted having a beer and pizza!  i missed the photo-op of him and one of my faithful, most generous girlfriends both on the couch with beer in hand!  it was one of the few down times we had!

me and two of my girls that made this happen!  they were rock stars!!  we couldn't have done it without them!!  and me with the hostess of the mostess!  you can see i'm a bit dishoveled at this point!  we were exhausted!!

even the kids were pooped after a long couple of days playing together, but still so cute hangin' tight together until the end! 

and the boys were helping make sure we got our veggies in after a long day!

so after the dust settled over the two day marathon, we figured it was time to count it up and see what God had done.  as we were counting, i was getting increasingly overwhelmed.  we went into the hundreds, then in to the thousands.  after we had gotten done, we realized there was another donation jar that we hadn't even touched!  we made over $4,750 toward our travel expenses!  all glory to God for providing every penny.  it reminded us of the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000.  we were certain He multiplied the bills overnight!!  we were selling things for pennies, and people were bartering down to $.25 on a $.50 item!  of course we had overly generous donations from special friends as well, but still, who can do that at a garage sale??  there's only One i know who can!  and He showed up in a huge way.  He has it down to every detail.  when i added up all the 20's, it added up to the year i was born!!  it could have been 20 more or 20 less, but it was exactly the year i was born!!  i just chuckled to myself.  it's one of those sweet kisses from my Lord that shows his sovereignty!  once again, i am humbled by that sovereignty, His gracious love, and my desperate need for Him. 

"are not two sparrows sold for a penny?  and not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.  but even the hairs of your head are all numbered."  matthew 10:29-30

i can't thank all of the people enough who contributed their items, their time, their baked goods for the bake sale, their house, their love and their support!  it means the world to us that we can share with our girls how many people were involved in bringing them home!  we could not do it without you all!!  thank you!

cupcakes???

i can't even begin to tell you how detailed God has orchestrated all the details in our life lately!  we have been overwhelmed with His mercy and care for us throughout this process.  i know He has done it all along, but it's been so blatant lately, which has been awesome for me!  i have to share a story a great friend experienced the other day! 

she happened to take the little girl of the family she lives with to school this last wednesday.  well, she needed to talk to the teacher about some milk cartons they were supposed to bring.  they had sent some in, but apparently they were the wrong size.  they couldn't find the paper that was sent home with the info on it, so she had to go in and talk to the teacher.  as she was standing there waiting to talk to her, there was a mom of one of the students that had a couple of bins of cupcakes that she had made for her daughter's birthday to share with the class.  well, teacher tells her that she can't leave them since they were homemade, they have to be store bought.  so, friend dismisses it and walks out to her car, saddened for mom and her daughter.  she buckles in and feels God telling her to go buy the cupcakes from the other mom.  "buy cupcakes?  what, God, do you think i'm going to do with those???" she protests as she's trying to rationalize why He would have her do this!  but obediently (not without arguing...boy i'm glad i'm not the only one!!), she drives up to the mom's car and rolls her window down, "bummer about the cupcakes, but i think i'm supposed to buy them from you."  "no, here, you go ahead and take one tray to work, i'll take the other," mom says.  "no, really, i think i'm supposed to buy both of them from you." friend says.  yeah, it's getting a little awkward at this point.  now friend doesn't carry cash with her at all usually, in arguing with God, she found she happened to have $10 in her wallet.  so she hands it out the window, mom hands her the purple frosted cupcakes, friend sits in her car wondering what on earth she is going to do with these cupcakes.  "why Lord," she's praying.....He answers her...."wilkerson garage sale!"  unbelievable!  she drives off happy as a clam to have been obedient to be a part of bringing these two little orphans home soon!  mom slaved over those cupcakes the night before, little did she know she was doing God's work providing for the bake sale we are doing in conjuction with a garage sale this weekend for travel funds. 

this is only one of several stories that overwhelm my heart with what a gracious and sovereign and mighty God we have!  how, just how, have i deserved to receive His mercy and see Him this way?  people strive all their life to fill a void that only He can fill, and He's allowed me to not only know Him, but to see Him in ways people only dream about!  i am humbled by His majesty!  He loves these girls, and He wants them home!

happy birthday girls!

 

 we got these pictures of the girls today on their 2nd birthday!  we couldn't be more excited to actually have pictures of them on their birthday!  when my boys have one of their birthdays, we always get pictures of them, and they love looking at them.  we don't have any pictures of the girls except for the few we've received since january.  we won't be able to show them what they looked like when they turned a year old, or when they were first born, or when they took their first steps.  these pictures will be highly treasured as we begin to record their life so we can share it with them.  what a special gift to have seen them on their special day as we celebrate without them. we can't wait to hold them, love on them, and embrace them as our own!!!

the wait is over...

so finally monday rolls around, we haven't heard by our case worker (ok, every minute seems like an eternity at this point), so i decide to make up an excuse to call her.  sure enough, the girls are healthy!!!!  "how long did she know," i am wondering,  "doesn't she realize we are already the irrational adoptive parents and shouldn't be kept waiting?!!" 

i must confess, i used to get so frustrated when adoptive parents would be so irritated when there was any kind of a delay in the process.  "you signed up for this, you knew it was going to take so long, what is your issue??" was always going through my head in response to them.  now i get it.  when you have been given such a gift as little people coming into your family, you will stop at nothing to get them here even one minute sooner.  we know what conditions they are living in, we know what we have waiting for them here, and we can't wait to have them physically and spiritually be a part of our family.  they are part of our family, but missing at the same time.  a very unexplainable feeling! 

but, saddle up wilkerson's, here we go!  "we have to move fast" case worker says.  we are now on a crazy paperwork adventure, and it must be done 'speed lightning style' (quoted from my boys)!  our adoption kind of went backwards (most things in our life do)!!  usually you have all of your paperwork completed, stuff done, ducks in a row, before you get a referral (kids assigned to you).  well, we weren't quite there yet, but thankfully after some not so gentle nudges, we were a lot closer than we would have been!  we spend a good month chasing down paperwork, getting doctors' letters, notary after notary after notary, oh, then state notaries (apparently the first ones aren't good enough for international stuff).  february was a whirlwind of a month, to say the least.  but we did it, we have all of our paperwork! 

we are moving into march at this point and we are waiting for our dossier (a fancy word for a packet of very expensive paperwork) to be translated into french, drc's national language.  the first weekend of march was hubby's birthday, his 35th to be exact, and we got the news that the dossier was getting prepared over that weekend.  it was sent off to the drc on monday, march 5!  what an awesome gift to my hubby.  i can see how prevalently God is working out every detail!  hubby is the one who always said we were going to have twin girls, hubby wouldn't have considered this if we were able to have more kids on our own, their birth date is half of my date (13x2 b/c of twins = 26th, my bday!!), we were getting pushed along the way to get our booty in gear on our paperwork or we couldn't have been ready to get them, and on his bday weekend their paperwork is sent down.  now some may say it's all a coincidence, i call it God's perfect will!  things have been perfectly orchestrated for waayyyy too long for this all to be a coincidence!  i rest knowing our God has our back.  it doesn't mean it's going to be peaches and roses, but He has our back!  he had already answered our prayers with these two little girls all those times i cried and prayed myself to sleep from another negative pregnancy test.  it may not look like what we thought it would, but thankfully He knows best.  how neat it is to see him working so clearly!  our God is an awesome God!

did we ask for girls, since we already have boys?

so from here out, things continue to progress and we take our sweet time getting things together.  we were adopting from haiti at this point, so see, there was no rush.  we had to wait until hubby turned 35 in march.  so, we thought we had all the time in the world to obtain doctor’s letters, reference letters, 14 hours of training to complete, etc.  i’ll spare you the details, but a few events occurred along the way that made us get our booty in gear!  i mention it only because we trust this was God’s little nudge for us to be prepared for these girls.  otherwise, as stated above, we were taking our time, and would not have been ready for what He had for us!

one thing lead to another and we were gearing up in january to get our final paperwork done and waiting for our home study to be completed. we were actually getting close to needing it for haiti's timeline.  as we work through this, rumors are flying all over about how haiti adoptions are getting unstable and moving at a snail’s pace (we can thank unicef for most of that).  so the week of january 16, 2012, there were some meetings down in haiti with the government regarding adoptions and how slow they were moving.  we happened to call our agency on thursday afternoon, the 19^th, to find out how the meetings went and what that means for us and our adoption.  “brenda, it’s not looking good!” case worker says.  ugh…she could sense my silence and disappointment on the other end and solemnly moved on to more of the nitty gritty we needed to get through.  She came to the “have you guys decided on a gender?” question.  sigh….we’ve been avoiding this!  see, God made it clear to us that we were to get siblings.  he didn’t make it clear to us what gender they were supposed to be.  we would love to have a girl (i’ve been surrounded by boys all my life…not that there’s anything wrong with them, i love what they’ve taught me, but it sure could be fun to have someone to craft with instead of ride motorcycles or atv’s with!!).  “we’re not shopping for a coat, our hands are wide open, we can’t put God in a box on this one” i tell her. 

so that day happened to be a day off for hubby.  there was some crazy freezing rain/snow/ice thing going on outside, so the whole city shut down for the most part.  so he’s home playing a game with the kids on the floor of the office overhearing me from the family room.  “ok, i’ve been debating this whole conversation to tell you about this, because i know you want haiti, and you shut me down on the drc before, but we just got info on twin girls last night.  do you think that would be something you would even consider….” case worker says.  i interrupt, “did you say twin girls??” 

hubby has said for years we would have twin girls in our family.  i argued vehemently that I was not carrying or birthing twins, period!  of course my not-so eaves dropping hubby (it was an important conversation…he wanted to hear too!!) comes flying out of the office pointing at me saying “i told you we were going to have twin girls” in triumph.  wait a minute, we haven’t even talked about this, i’m thinking.  how do you figure this is a done deal?! 

it was a done deal, we just didn’t know it yet!  case worker hasn’t even gotten the medicals on them, and wouldn’t until after the weekend.  so we tell her we’ll pray about it and wait and see what the medicals say.  i must confess, we both felt we weren’t prepared to deal with some major illnesses/impairments.  that is one thing that we feel we are not in any way equipped to deal with.  i feel like a huge jerk saying it, but it is the reality of our sinful selves.  so after brief prayer and discussion, we determine they are definitely an option.  i call her back and tell her to let us know as soon as she knows.  so the wait begins…one of the longest weekends of our life!  how have we already come to love them? 

The beginning....kind of

here we are, setting up our new blog to journal our adventures in our adoption process!  because so much has happened, and it's all so relevant to our story, i'll have to post a few pieces at a time!  so stay tuned...

i must say, i never really thought this could happen!  my hubby hates it when i tell people this, but he was never interested in adoption (he thinks it makes him sound ugly, i think it makes him sound real).  it took almost three years of unexplained infertility (we looked at each other with our first two....seriously!!) before God changed his heart and he began considering it (ok, combined with a little begging from me!).  we knew we wanted more kids, but it wasn't working out how we planned!  which is half of the fun of our story!  while he had come around and was ready for the process last spring, i had a mission trip to haiti planned that summer, so we decided we'd wait until my return.   "one thing at a time" we'd say!  after returning and seeing the faces of those little children, desperate and hungry for more than just food, we decided it was time to start the process.  haiti happens to have a lot of stipulations for their adoptions, several of which we didn't meet.  after talking to two agencies and getting told we needed to meet a bit more of their criteria, (which meant a year and a half wait time) we tabled the idea and figured we didn't have an option.  now let me just say that hubby was willing to adopt from anywhere, but me...i wanted haiti!  half my heart was still there after the mission trip, so i wanted to bring a piece of it home and have a small part in helping a country and a people i had come to love so quickly.  so the waiting began.  not shortly after, however, we met a couple by not-so accident at a mission fair we put on at our church.  "you need to call our gal in spokane, she can get you started," they told us!  two days later i called her, two days later she called me back, and we were off and running with our homestudy scheduled the following week.  yikes!  it's getting official!!!